


ocean rush and selflessness

by acroamatica



Category: Seven Psychopaths (2012)
Genre: M/M, bad language, but like we all already knew everyone in this movie is basically a terrible person, colin farrell smells good: the fanfic, poor decisions, some mild homophobia, the mcd tag is because i assume you've seen the movie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-10
Updated: 2017-06-10
Packaged: 2018-11-12 10:57:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11160444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/acroamatica/pseuds/acroamatica
Summary: It starts with the blue jacket Marty takes off one lazy summer afternoon.





	ocean rush and selflessness

**Author's Note:**

  * For [seasonsgredence](https://archiveofourown.org/users/seasonsgredence/gifts).



> someone said "clothes sharing".
> 
> (seasons said "clothes sharing", or more accurately "clothes stealing", or more accurately something along the lines of "hans finds out that billy has a box of marty's clothes; discuss", but i _heard_ "clothes sharing").
> 
> this is what happens when you light the julian signal.
> 
> hello, all five other people in this fandom :D

It starts with the blue jacket Marty takes off one lazy summer afternoon, four beers down and warm and happy. Billy finds it over the back of the couch and folds it up, nicely, because he really does mean to give it back. Marty likes this jacket. He wears it all the time, so much that the collar and the breast of it smell… good. Like his cologne and the wax he puts in his hair sometimes when he’s being metrosexual. But that’s not weird. Cologne’s supposed to smell good. 

It’s a little weird when Marty comes over after a jog, and he’s sweating off a hangover, sharp and chemical. Billy offers his shower (Marty, panting, red-cheeked, nods and drags his arm across his face) and tosses a clean t-shirt on the counter, because that’s what friends do. 

Maybe it’s not what friends do, when he rescues Marty’s crumpled, filthy white shirt from the floor, but he’s gonna wash it.

He’s gonna wash his own shirt, when Marty brings it back, too. He is.

(It comes back already washed, but it smells like Marty’s laundry soap, and… that’s okay.)

Marty leaves a hat on his kitchen counter, and a scarf - okay, the scarf is fucking annoying, it's something Marty picked up from this Italian dude he’s been working with. It's California, it’s like 75 degrees every day, what's he need a fucking scarf for, like he's some kind of European? Sure, technically being Irish is European. But he doesn't have to get all gay about it. So Billy doesn't want to give him back the scarf at all. 

He does have to concede that it's a nice scarf. It's silk. Billy can dig that. It’s soft and light, and it has that same cologne smell from sitting around Marty's throat and down the collar of his shirt. Stronger than the shirt or the jacket had it. 

He’s always wondered what silk feels like, worn that close, every day. He flops down on the bed, puts his face in the scarf, and inhales. Inhales. Inhales, until he can't smell it anymore. Then he stuffs it under his pillow so Marty won't see it and make him give it back.

“Hey, Marty,” he asks, later that week. “What's that cologne you're always wearing?”

“I don't know.” Marty shades his eyes, and Billy thinks about the hat he’s shoved into the top drawer of his dresser. “It’s - I think Kaya gave it to me?”

“Oh,” Billy says sourly. 

“No. No, I tell a lie. Wasn't Kaya, it was Linne. The one before her.”

Something eases in Billy's chest. “I remember her,” he says, although he doesn't really. He thinks she was blonde too. Marty likes blondes. But they never last.

“I never wore it then,” Marty says. “Found it a while back, though. I guess it's nice. _Ocean Rush_ , or some nothing name like that. Why?”

Billy wiggles a little deeper into his chair. “No reason,” he says.

Marty gives him a look. “You hate it.”

“I don't hate it, Marty. You're right. It's nice.”

_Ocean Rush_ , he thinks, and it sounds like the surf. He fucking loves the beach.

“We should go to the beach,” he says, and Marty blinks at him, and squints, and says “Yeah, all right.”

They don't go to the beach, in the end, but Billy tells a joke and it makes Marty crinkle up around the eyes and laugh that high breathless boyish laugh that means he’s really tickled, and it's like being in the sun. 

\---

It’s a couple of days before Billy’s good mood starts to wear thin. Marty isn't listening, about his script - he goes through phases where he does this, where he starts believing his own press. It's fine, because he is a great writer, but - it's not fine, because if he was really that good he wouldn’t need Billy’s help, which he does. And then Billy gets blood on his leather jacket, and the neighbours are at it _again_ , and okay, he may have set fire to their lawn a _little_ but he put it out again, and they didn't even know it was him, and they should stop glaring at him every time he pulls out of the driveway. So it's not really a great time for Hans to find the red sweater Marty dropped the last time he was in Billy’s car.

“I’m gonna give it back next time I see him,” Billy says, before Hans can say anything more than the simple question of whose it is.

“I’m sure you are,” Hans says, in that way he says things when Billy knows he means the opposite.

“I’m a good friend,” Billy says. “I would never steal Marty’s clothes.”

“I didn’t think you would.” Hans puts the sweater back down on Billy’s coffee table. 

He’s glad he left it there. It looks like he left it out to remind himself that he had it, and not at all like he spent last night with it wrapped around his own shoulders. It was cold. Marty wouldn’t have minded, _obviously_ , he’s Billy’s best friend and Jesus, don’t you have to look out for your friends when they’re cold, to be sure, to be sure, which was something that Marty would totally say to Billy if he asked him.

Billy would look out for Marty. Billy is already looking out for Marty. But Marty’s busy, he’s busy with his script and his bitch girlfriend and his life and not Billy, right now, so Billy has to take care of himself _for_ Marty. Which means he needs the sweater.

He takes it back, and holds it protectively against his chest, where he gets hints of Ocean Rush and the warm and slightly boozy smell of Marty, like he’s sitting next to Billy on this couch, having a laugh.

Billy is calm. He’s a rock in the river of life. He’s a leaf on the fucking wind. He’s whatever fake hippie bullshit means that he accepts the things that happen and flows smoothly onwards. He’s calm.

“C’mon, Hans,” he says, and puts the sweater down. “We got dogs to steal.”

\---

He shouldn’t have gone to the fucking party. He knows that. He knew that to begin with. But he thought -

Doesn’t matter. Marty wasn’t having a good time. And when Marty isn’t having a good time, he drinks even more than when he is, and he says shit, and Billy can see it in his eyes, because Billy is Marty’s best friend and he knows - he knows Marty doesn’t really mean it.

Except for the parts he does mean. And everyone knows those when they hear them.

Which is why Billy gives Kaya the extremely thoughtful and tasteful gift he picked out, and he doesn’t get mad when Marty calls him a _dog kidnapper_ in front of everyone, and he even says something kinda nice to her before he leaves, because he has a suspicion she’s about to hear a lot of things that maybe aren’t very nice.

When his phone rings at 2 in the morning and it’s Marty on the other end, half a block south of incoherent and near the intersection of furious and weepy, Billy thinks about the look in Marty’s eyes for a little while. But he’s still Marty’s best friend, and best friends go get their best friends in the middle of the night, even when said best friends were kinda mean to them - even when said best friends are blackout drunk and staggering and might puke in his car - even when it takes said best friends ten minutes to explain that their bitch girlfriend threw them out, and he thinks just this once she might have had a point - he’s still Marty’s best friend. And that’s a serious fucking responsibility.

Anyway, Marty doesn’t puke in Billy’s car, and by the time he comes out of the bathroom looking damp and sorry Billy’s found a spare blanket and chased Bonny off the couch twice, and Billy feels pretty good about the fact that he thinks of helping Marty get his jeans and boots off so he’ll sleep more comfortably, because Billy is clearly a terrific friend. Maybe the best friend ever.

He even lets Bonny stay with Marty. To keep an eye on him. But also because Bonny’s a good dog, and Marty will feel better if he wakes up in his best friend’s house, with a soft dog to hold onto, and maybe if Marty feels better he won’t think the things he says when he’s this drunk.

Maybe, Billy thinks, as he puts his head back onto his own pillow, and the trailing edge of Marty’s scarf sneaks out from under it to brush his cheek like a caress - maybe this is the start of great things for Marty. And it’s all because his best friend, Billy Bickle, cares about him, and is there for him.

It’s a nice thought to fall asleep to. It’s an even nicer thought when he wakes up and Marty’s still passed out on his couch, dead to the world. 

Marty needs him. He has nobody else, right now, and this is Billy’s reward for all this hard work - Marty, depending on him, as ready as he’s ever gonna be to listen when Billy tells him how to fix up his life, and he can’t keep the smile off his face as he watches Bonny nuzzle up to Marty.

Yeah, it’s gonna be a good day.

\---

Okay, so maybe he’s overplayed it a little. Marty talks about bloody murders and violence and death all day, but one near miss - not that he was ever _really_ in that much danger, Billy was gonna save him, Billy was _always_ gonna save him - but he can’t exactly tell Marty that, and he feels kind of bad that he’s come around the corner to check what was taking him so long, and here’s his best friend shirtless and sitting on the edge of the tub with his face in his hands, shaking.

Billy’s pretty sure he’s not supposed to have seen this. Or heard the sharp note in Marty’s breathing.

But Marty hasn’t seen him, so it’s okay, it’s fine. He backs up four or five steps around the corner, and makes more noise coming back. “Hey Marty,” he calls. “You need anything?”

This time Marty’s looking up at the door, and he’s still pretty grey-faced but he’s not crying. At least, Billy doesn’t think he is. He’s dripping like he stuck his whole head under the tap.

“I can’t - I can’t wear these,” Marty says, his voice still too high and too hoarse. He kicks the stained and crumpled heap of his clothes with the toe of his boot. “I don’t.”

“It’s okay,” Billy says quickly. And it is. He can definitely solve this problem, because he is resourceful and smart and knows exactly what to do. “Lemme see what I got that you can wear.”

For a minute he thinks he could just… give Marty back his own sweater. But he clenches his fingers jealously into the knit and shoves it back into the drawer, grabbing his soft grey hoodie - one of his favourites - and heading back to the bathroom.

“Here,” he says, and presses it into Marty’s hands. “I think it’ll fit.”

It doesn’t really, but he likes the way it looks on Marty anyway. 

Halfway into it, Marty pauses, with one bare shoulder hanging out. “Billy,” he says. He sounds lost.

“We’ll go get your stuff from Kaya later,” Billy says encouragingly. “While she’s at work, before she tosses it all out on the lawn and sets fire to it.”

Marty gives him a look, but the kind that Billy is more used to. Finally, _finally_ , the corner of his pale lips twitches upwards.

Billy claps him on the shoulder. “That’s the spirit.”

\---

“You seen that blue jacket of mine?” Marty says. The words are muffled by the closet he is halfway inside. “Or my red sweater?”

Billy, who is loading up a bankers box with all the notebooks on Marty’s desk, grins.

“No, man,” he says, and taps the stack of notebooks square. “Maybe she threw them out.”

Marty looks around the closet door. “You really think she’d have done that?”

“She’s a fuckin’ bitch, Marty.” Billy shrugs. “Bitches do that.”

Marty’s eyebrows climb slowly towards his hairline. And then he snorts. “I guess they do.”

\---

\---

_The boxes and all that are still stacked neatly out of the way when Marty lets himself in, caked in road dust and sweat and dried tears. He needs a shower. He needs a baptism. He needs…_

_He can’t spare the energy to unpack anything right at this moment. But Billy won’t mind, he never does, he’ll come home and find Marty wearing his shirt and he’ll laugh, won’t he?_

_Where do normal people keep their clean shirts? Top drawer of the dresser._

_The sound of the drawer on its wooden rails is so loud in the silence that it makes him jump, and then laugh out of nervousness, and then -_

_That’s his sweater._

_And underneath it is his t-shirt, and his hat._

_He slams the drawer shut as if he’s seen a ghost, and clutches his shaking hands against each other._

_Billy keeps his clean buttondowns in the closet, of course, and Marty doesn’t look at the jackets, doesn’t look at the blue one amongst the brown and black, doesn’t look, because Billy will know he looked, and he doesn’t -_

_He’s gonna be home any minute._

_He’s…_

_Marty throws himself down on the edge of the bed and swipes an open palm at the nearest pillow, sending it flying in a gesture of pure impotent rage and frustration._

_The silk scarf flutters to the floor._

_Very slowly, he bends over and picks it up._

_Something that isn’t quite laughter begins to shake him, and doesn’t stop._

_When he wipes his wet cheeks with it, he catches the scent in the fabric._

_It smells like Billy._


End file.
